The Duty to Refuse in Dignitatis Personae

This paper clarifies the ethical basis of objections in conscience to vaccines which depend for their development on the use of cell lines derived from abortion. (By 'depend' on we mean either in production or in testing necessary for any process of regulatory approval.) The objection is not that the use of such vaccines by patients or consumers would involve some kind of 'cooperation' with abortion or even complicity (so-called 'appropriation.') Rather, it is that medical personnel, including researchers and pharmaceutical companies, are ethically proscribed from using such cell lines in any research whatsoever. Therefore, patients and consumers must be allowed the freedom in conscience to decline to use medical products which are developed by such researchers, entities or companies -- just as they are, in other contexts, accorded freedom of conscience to refuse to do business with entities engaged in what they regard as seriously unethical business practices. We develop our argument in relation to a document published by the Vatican office for doctrinal and religious integrity several years *prior* to the Covid pandemic and therefore not affected by biases which might be thought to color much recent reflection on the matter.